X-Men Origins: Wolverine

It is a rare thing that living in Ireland offers a scoop on films, but I have just gotten back from Wolverine, and as a die-hard screaming X-Men fan girl, I have one important thing to say:
Gambit didn’t suck.
Non-spoilery comments on the film behind the cut, but one other thing if you’re like me and don’t read these kinds of blog comment thingies at all (ah yes, I are a professional writer, do not try this at home) until after you’ve seen the movie: stay through the credits.

Ok, I went in expecting it to suck. I hoped it wouldn’t, but I went in expecting them to screw it up every minute of the way, and they continually didn’t screw it up, so basically I was happy with the film. Two thumbs up.
I liked the Creed/Logan relationship a *lot*. I thought it worked better than any of the various comic-book versions, and I liked how much time they spent developing it. And Liev was a *fantastic* Sabretooth. I loved him.
I don’t even *like* Ryan Reynolds, but there wasn’t enough Deadpool. So he apparently done good.
Gambit (upon whom, yes, I am hung up; I’ve been waiting a Very Long Time for Gambit to appear on film!), astonishingly, didn’t suck. This is a miracle on par with X-Men the movie not sucking, which, frankly, was simply impossible, and nine years later I’m still amazed that it didn’t. Still, I had no faith they’d pull off the Ragin’ Cajun with any degree of success, and I am happy to report that my lack of faith has been pleasantly surprised.
The accent, unbelievably, was pretty good. The powers-I’ve seen people bitching, all ZOMG what is he like a TEKE now what with all the card-throwing we saw in the trailers, but in fact while there was less pink, more boom than in the comics, I genuinely thought they’d done a really good job of showing what his powers would look like *in action*, as opposed to the still frames of comics. It was a little *different*-again, less pink more boom, but I thought the way he used his powers, particularly with regards to his staff, worked really well. I would have done his eyes differently, in the same way I’d have done Rogue’s hair differently, but I’m willing to accept how they *did* do it.
Emma was not what I expected. I am highly interested to see if they go on with her.
My biggest bitch with the film was they used too much CGI. CGI claws when it wasn’t necessary; when it was, in fact, distracting, CGI Sabes doing things I don’t view as very Sabes-like, overblown effects that would’ve looked better done with wires instead of the not-quite-real-enough CGI, stuff like that. I wasn’t crazy about the cinematic choices in some of the fight scenes-I wanted them clearer so I could see the throw-downs better-but really, that’s my biggest complaint. I thought the story was solid and I was surprisingly happy with it.
Also, the bit after the credits, which is reportedly different in different countries, made me squee happily. So there you go!